I won't write much here, but just let's say that time is now going to be a challenge. We don't any of us know how long we have, nor whether we will live our years out in peace and enjoyment, or sorrow, sadness, and weakness, dependent on others.

My family is faced now with a challenge about time. Have we spent enough of this time truly together? Will one leave the other alone and sorrowful? Will this person be able to survive the grief? Why am I talking already about grief? Because of the tears that have flowed so sadly this past week. How long is left? How will we make it? Scared, confused, sorrowful, yet, must trust God, must.

Yes, I seem to be going out of my mind, literally. Medication changes. I am a person who needs to accomplish something to feel good about myself, whether that be getting a certificate for completing a class or writing a poem. Some months it is even paying the bills. Or better, get a paycheck, instead of a disability check.

Today, after a long time of trying to figure out what/who I really am, I wrote a poem. Probably because of the MOOC that I am taking from Coursera.org - a poetry class, of other people's poetry, not writing poetry. But not before tormenting the testosterone-enabled beings in the household with a suicide watch, so sorry folks, but I cannot tolerate my little sanctuary being invaded anymore with loud voices that seem to be coming down on me. Oh, do I want to tell the world about this? Do I? Well, there is nothing cut in stone here. I could be bluffing, lying just for effect. How do you know I am telling the truth? How does anyone know if they are telling the truth? Evidence? There is none.The picture? A closeup of the top of the Space Needle in Seattle, all lit up, slightly distorted like my brain on this new prescription, as if there was this cramping of my frontal lobe, a dehydration of sorts - will call doctor tomorrow and quit, though I do say the poem I wrote was rather good. Can you tell that this was taken off the television set (yes, an older model set, not HD for sure). The one below shows the reflection of the camera flash in the upper left corner, but if I had not told you, well, what would you have thought? Aliens invading? Lights in the sky? Yes, out of my mind.

Family - gotta love 'em. They are moving in and this Grannie could not be happier. But will that take time from my classes at Coursera? It's okay with me, because the classes are free! No pressure to perform, unless I put pressure on me. I will be squeezing hugs out of my grandkids while I am squeezing my time to do as much as I possibly can.

Now, if we could just get some MOOC type classes designed for children. The six-year old is very computer literate, well, rather is electronic equipment literate. Can use that Xbox set up for television, videos, games, Netflix. Good at it, too, creates different Avatars. He has used my Android tablet, too, quite easily. Uses mobile phones. Only six.

I only wish they would design classes for this type of accelerated intelligence. We need to design these classes sooner than later, and not charge for them. I looked into online classes that follow the standards that all the states will soon be using, and it was not really "online," per se. Kids could not just go to an online class and start watching a video and learning. It was more geared toward an interface between the parent and the study materials (and I did review a video, these kids are going to be bored with this material, I'm sorry to say). If a child has been playing hardcore video games and understands how they work, the objectives, goals, he (or she) is going to need more stimulation in their learning process. I am afraid our teachers are not going to be able to keep up and then think the child is not able to do the classroom work, when in reality the child is more skilled and able to learn than the school's standards. Hurts me to think about it. Yes, children need some direction in learning, but people would be surprised at how much they really could learn if we understood their studying capabilities.

So, how about it, Coursera? Why not develop some classes for students that are going to directly design video classes for the children, not the adults? It is time!

Studying takes time. Most courses listed with Coursera, the MOOC (Massive Open Online Course) we have been discussing on this website, will give you a general idea of how many hours per week you should spend studying in the class. Some are small, just a couple of hours a week, others six, and I believe I had one class that expected us to put twenty hours of our time into that class.

It was worth it, that class, Medical Neuroscience. I will have to take it again, though, because I could not even spend that much of my time then in that class studying. Of course, I got sick during the first couple of weeks and missed too much to get back into it. But I did save most of the data from that class, and it is still open for me to peruse as I need, I believe.

What do you need to understand about scheduling your time for your MOOC class? I may not have all the answers yet, but I have been taking classes from Coursera since February this year, and I have gotten down a system. My system may not work for you, and you may not need as much time to learn from a course, or you may have to devise your own way of organizing your study schedule.

I am not going to talk about discipline here. Some folks like it, others work off the cuff. Each is a valid way to work, though the disciplined folks tend to think those of us who like to binge learn are not doing the thing justice. If I was studying to be a brain surgeon, I might agree with you. But these are FREE online courses, and should be enjoyed!

Speaking about enjoyment, you alone can decide how much time you want to put into studying, or whether you even want to call it studying. If studying makes you feel pressure (time pressure, after all this is about time), then call it something else. Maybe learning, re-educating yourself, adding to your skillset - call it something that will draw you back to it. I just call it Coursera.

You might want to calendar every little event from a class, when it starts, ends, when each week starts, when the quizzes are due, prep time for assignments, due dates for assignments, for peer reviews. I, personally, have learned that I work best from a rolling schedule. At the top are the classes that require discussion forums with a note how many per week or per class. Then I have the next date that something is due, and I just write due dates chronologically, something like this:

That way, if I am paying attention to this daily (time again), then I will know I have to have studied Week 2 for Social Epidemiology before July 18 and Week 1 for Intro to Public Speaking, IF I want to do well on those tests. I usually try to do the quizzes a day before, in case my score is not good, so I can do a retake or two. If I accomplish, pass a test, I will just write "DONE" after the item. Then when the day passes, I just cut and paste it to the bottom of the list so I have an ongoing log of what I did attempt. Works for me. P.A. stands for Peer Assignment, or peer review. Asmt. just means Assignment.

You can work that list anyway you want and just type it into WordPad (or other simple text editor) so that you don't have to make it very complicated. I tried to do an Excel spreadsheet for classes and it got really messy fast, so I just uncomplicated it and was much happier. Some of the classes will create a calender you can add to Outlook, and I sometimes do that, but it just clutters up my month page, and doesn't really work for me.If you have a lot of things going on in your life, you will have to schedule time to enjoy your classes. As for me, I probably average 80 hours per week I can use to study, unless my kids and grandkids are here visiting. Then Coursera is out the window (sorry) and I am really enjoying myself!Well, time to go enjoy Coursera for awhile!